The Nvidia RTX 4080 could near power consumption of the 3090 Ti

Originally uncovered by VideoCardz, we may have some news regarding the upcoming Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080. In a recent Twitter post by frequent Nvidia leaker @kopite7kimi, the user speculates that the upcoming PG139-SKU360 model of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 could have a 420W TDP (Thermal Design Power) at full usage. This would greatly surpass the prior generation’s RTX 3080 reference design. The current-gen RTX 3080 requires 100W less than the rumored 420W TDP of the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080.

Rumors are still far from consistent at this point, as Nvidia tends to be proficient at keeping final specs secret. Target performance goals and specs can also change due to the complex development cycles for components such as graphics cards. With this in mind, it’s important to not take this rumor as fact.

We can however look at rumors from a distance and observe some consistent trends at this point. Nearly all industry sources expect Nvidia to push the RTX 4000 Series harder in terms of power consumption. This has been the sentiment for over a year now.

Why so power hungry?

The reasoning for this is simple enough. The overwhelming popularity of the RTX 3080 and other high power consumption graphics cards showed Nvidia that plenty of gamers want more performance at the cost of performance-per-watt efficiency.

Nvidia can essentially sell its GPUs as if overclocked, while providing consumers with guaranteed stability and warranties. The downsides to this philosophy are that performance doesn’t usually scale as efficiently past certain frequencies, and larger coolers are required to keep the GPUs and memory cool.

High power RTX 4000 Series graphics cards will likely be pricey and huge like this Gigabyte RTX 3090 Ti, but are expected to seriously perform.

The other reason is competition. AMD is expected to launch its Radeon 7000 Series graphics cards based on the RDNA 3 architecture later this year. Nvidia’s cause for concern with this is a new approach to using multiple GPUs on a single package, similar (in simple terms) to how Ryzen CPUs use chiplets to form single processors.

This patented technology would give AMD a huge edge, as it could link together two GPUs operating at more efficient frequencies for more overall performance than a single GPU could deliver. This would explain why Nvidia’s RTX 4000 Series may be so power hungry to match AMD’s design advantage.

When should you expect the RTX 4000 Series?

Rumors surrounding the release of new Nvidia GeForce cards are plentiful, but still have yet to be cohesive with one another. In a recent leak, it was revealed that the new series could release as early as July. In the past few months @kopite7kimi and other sources have been busy, consistently leaking information on the upcoming models. Considering that AMD is expected to release alongside Nvidia, this fall might be primetime for the next generation of graphics cards.

It makes sense for Nvidia to go as big as possible with high frequencies and big TDP numbers for the RTX 4080 and other models with AMD hot on its tail. The new Radeon GPUs are scheduled to launch later this year, and many expect AMD to be very competitive with Nvidia for the foreseeable future.

Possible RTX 4080, PG139-SKU360, has a 420W TGP, still uses AD103.

— kopite7kimi (@kopite7kimi) June 6, 2022